Styling celebrities for a living and getting paid in millions is totally a beautiful dream. But how will you make the dream a reality?
Becoming a celebrity fashion stylist is definitely not easy; even if you have attended some Grade-A school, have stretched your skills in both theory & practical and have good experience. But don’t get all worked up, it’s not a difficult task – patience, persistent, talent and hard work is the key to get yourself lodged amongst the celebrities.
Careerlancer went through quite a few interviews of celebrity stylists, such as Basia Richard (who has styled Selena Gomez) to find out what it takes to become one of the highest grossing celebrity fashion-stylists.
We have rounded up top 6 tips for becoming a successful celebrity stylist. So, aspiring freelancers, this is your chance to buckle up your seat and race higher.
1. Do A Couple Of Internships – It’s All About It
An internship at a branded fashion consultant or with designer is a good place to start your career. Recommendations and references is the part of the industry and that’s how things work in media.
Start as an intern and then become an assistant. You have to bond with stylists or designers so they recommend you to celebrities or their managers.
Working with celebrities is like the biggest breakthrough you will ever get. Celebrities are not keen about new faces and don’t believe in trial and error methods. They are so tied up with work that they want quick fixes to all their styling problems; so recommendation from another stylist is very important.
Interning also gives you the valuable time of honing your skills on the –job.
2. Create And Build Your Lookbook
As an intern, you will also get an opportunity to start building your portfolio under the guidance of expert professionals. In fashion industry, a Lookbook is a collection of photos that represents your styling work. The purpose of the Lookbook is showing off your skills to different agencies and celebrities while simultaneously creating a strong client base.
You have to also learn how to create a fashion Lookbook, a foundation upon which your career will take shape.
3. Research A Lot
Yes, you have to spend a lot of time in researching your work. Like weather, fashion changes every year and sometimes, twice a year. You have to spend a lot of time on the computer to become a celebrity online fashion stylist.
Basia Richard says, “I’m researching different looks, making appointments, gathering all the pieces for a look. It’s a lot of screen time!”
Internet is the only place where you can check fashion trends, updates and preferences of celebrities from around the world.
4. Prepare For The Long Strenuous Hours Of Work
Being a freelance celeb stylist means involving in styling two or more celebrities at a time. Sounds fun? No, it isn’t. It involves a lot of hard work. You have to run around preparing for days for Red Carpet events, for not just one but for many artists and stars, simultaneously.
Styling celebrities also means magazine shoots and travelling for shoots, not to mention juggling accessories and shoes as well. Sometimes you have to work 24 hours a day as Hollywood never sleeps.
If you really want this then know that money is plenty in this fashion stylist career but you have to be ready for it and wait for ‘spur of the moment’ and ‘unexpected’ events.
5. Live Fashion, Breath-In Fashion And Breath-Out Celebrities
You have to actively and dedicatedly immerse yourself in the celebrity fashion realm. It’s huge and daunting at times,which also resonates charisma and magic, not to mention lime light and camera.
In order to be a part of this dynamic world, you have to be in and out of fashion shows, know the tit-bits of the fashion business, keep up with latest trends, study celebrities and their current stylists, run look tests in your mind and also have knowledge about celebrities’ off-camera style personality.
You have to make everyone happy and comfortable. So, knowing your client is an important success key.
6. Get Yourself A Professional Degree
The irony is most actors or celebrities need not have a degree to show-off, but the people working for them should have some degree to get started.
Although, we believe talent has nothing to do with degree, but if you have a major in Fashion Merchandising, you will get to learn about clothes, product development, cloth manufacturing, colour combination and more.
This is akind of like step-diving deep into the fashion world of celebrities. Styling is not about choosing the designer piece, but it also knowing the fabric, the stitch, the thread and how entire outfit came into existence.
There are many fashion institutions that are affiliated and accredited. Make sure you choose a suitable one that is nationally recognised.
We Have Few More For You….
These 6 tips were sorted from interviews given by celebrity stylists. Apart from them, Careerlancer also has compiled few additional advices that you can very well add to your tool kit;
- Believe in what you do – Sometimes your sense of fashion may be completely different from the rest 20 in the industry. You may be criticised for it but don’t listen to people. Create your own trend and set it. Standing out is the sure big thing in 2018.
- A good way to grow celebrity followers is showing –off work on social media Post pics of celebrities you have styled and ensure that you mention brand names for each product that went into the styling. Post as often as you can.
- Keep your passion strong for creating and innovating. Choose the road not taken if you want, try mixing up two- three attires and see how well those go with each other. Your passion lies in your imagination. Take it wild and far, beyond reach. Go funky. In fact we suggest try all genres, from classic to contemporary, for styling a celebrity. Give them variety to enjoy.
- Make sure you practice working in a team. Sometimes, you have to not only coordinate with a celebrity but also with his/her manager, hair stylist, make-up artist and jeweller. It could be a lot if you lose your composure.
